One Day The Sun Will Shine Again
by NoTimeToStop
Summary: When a broken, lonely stranger collapses outside the prison gates, Rick decides to help her. Is this haunted woman one of them or is she beyond saving? How will her arrival affect the Grimes family? {Set between seasons 3 and 4. Review!}
1. Prologue

**One Day The Sun Will Shine Again**

 **Prologue**

Cold and dark. How many days had it been now? She had lost count. Time had no meaning anymore. Months, days, hours, minutes, seconds – all meaningless, useless. There was nothing to look forward to now. Each day the same as the next. Who knew if they would still be alive by sunset? Waiting fearfully until morning light, but the day wasn't any safer than the night. Midnight became a marker of accomplishment – good for you, you survived another twenty-four hours. But sometimes she wondered what the point was. The end of the world had been reduced to a competition, survival of the fittest, to see who could live longest. Had she worked hard her entire life just to be bested by the brainless dead and the awful assholes who had taunted her in high school?

It wasn't fair. Life had never been fair, but the unfairness of the end of life on earth was downright cruel. Hadn't she always done her best to be a good person? Hadn't she given ten percent of her income to charity and let people go ahead of her in line? Where were all the decent people now? Answer: cracking open skulls and ribcages to slurp up the gore inside.

Kindness was dead. Maybe it had never existed. Maybe humanity and civility were lies. Maybe this was the truth of human nature, and they were finally being punished for it.

Once upon a time she had kept a bulletin board in the kitchen, tacked with notes and reminders, school notices and photos, calendars written with multicolored ink to track meetings, practices, games, and shows. Her life had once been divided into neat little charts and perfect American apple pies. She laughed bitterly, though the zombies - the gourmands, she called them ironically, because their hunger was never satisfied - were attracted to sound. The woods could be full of them. She couldn't help herself. How foolish and trivial the minutiae of her life seemed now. How desperately she wished for those days again.

The sun was finally rising, casting its golden light over the ground. The first shadows of morn. She had been walking all evening, too anxious to stop and rest. She needed to keep moving. Activity helped keep her from thinking. The pain in her body, her hands, her head, her feet, made her forget.

She could smell her own odor: sweat and unwashed flesh, the blood stained into her jeans and shirt. Hers, his, the undead's, that man's. Her hair was a tangled mess of windblown knots and twigs. What she wouldn't do for a comb, a toothbrush, and a caramel chocolate bar.

Leaves crunched under her spattered sneakers. To her left, the bushes rustled. She withdrew her knife, and took her defensive stance (thank God for the self-defense courses she had taken since university). If she was going to die, she wanted to greet the ugly son of a bitch head-on. A rabbit appeared and scurried across her path. She laughed. If she had the energy, she'd catch that rabbit and eat it. Funny. Once upon a time, she was a vegetarian.

Once upon a time the reanimated corpses of friends and neighbors weren't cannibals.

She continued walking. She didn't know what exactly she was searching for, but she would know when she found it. The sun rose steadily in the sky, beating down of her already burnt skin. Curse her fair complexion that had once attracted the boys, the lovely pattering of freckles on her nose. Her flesh couldn't handle this environment. Next pharmacy she came across, she was raiding it for sunscreen.

In the distance a tall, rectangular shape rose. It must be huge, judging from her distance. She shielded her eyes with her hand to cut out the glare. A tower. It looked like a tower. Maybe Rapunzel was up there waiting for company. She started walking again, keeping the tower in front of her. What kind of building had a tower?

Sanctuary, she hoped. She was going to find out.


	2. Chapter 1: Irrigation

**Chapter One**

Carl was sick of playing farmer. He was sick of tomatoes and cucumbers. He was sick of watching his father's potential waste into the ground like rain water. His father could be doing a lot more for this camp than just caring for vegetables, and they both knew it. He understood why Rick had decided to take a step back from leadership, after everything that had happened since their arrival at the prison, and he knew it was good and necessary for his father to take a rest. He also knew his father's hiatus was partially attributed to his own actions, to the cold way he had killed that teenage boy who worked for the Governor. But he couldn't understand why his father didn't move on from his failures, dust himself off, and continue to try. Rick Grimes was, and had always been, a man of strength, integrity, and courage. Did the crops benefit from those qualities? What about the people who needed him to be able to nurture and grow? What about the people who looked up to him? What about Carl, who had been looking up to him his entire life, and now saw his father lowered in the dirt, his quick fingers buried in the soil extracting weeds?

He would wait. He would follow his father's lead. Despite everything, he trusted his father implicitly.

"Carl, can you hand me that trowel?"

"Sure." Carl handed his father the small gardening shovel and watched as his father used it to turn over the soil, exposing the parched earth underneath the surface. It had been almost a week since they had received rain, and even the few walkers that congregated outside the fences were looking dusty and dehydrated.

"We'll have to work on bettering the irrigation system today." Rick stood and wiped his muddy hands on his jeans. "The stream is looking pretty dry. We may have to dig deeper-"

"Does that mean we have to go outside the fences?" Carl couldn't keep the excitement out of his voice. He hadn't ventured outside the prison gate in weeks, and despite the safety and relatively large space inside the confines, he was restless. He hated not being able to leave, hated that he was constantly surrounded by people. What he wouldn't give to step outside, even for a few minutes. He felt he finally understood how Axle and his fellow inmates felt. "Can I have my gun?"

Rick frowned.

"We'll need it." Carl quickly continued. "Just in case."

Rick shook his head. Carl wasn't ready yet. It was too soon. His son had been close to crossing a very dangerous line, into a kind of dark inhumanity Rick was sure would ruin him, smother all the goodness within him. Despite his verbal assurances otherwise, despite what he told others, he still believed there were some things a person just didn't come back from. He wasn't going to let that happen to either Carl or himself. "No."

"But-"

Rick silenced his son with a look, and gestured towards the fence. "There are barely any walkers, and a gunshot would only end up attracting more of them. I have my knife in case I need it, and Glenn is on watch if anything happens."

Carl didn't like his father's use of the singular personal pronoun. "I'm coming out with you."

"Carl, I-"

"C'mon, Dad. I've been stuck inside with nothing to do but read comic books for weeks."

"You could always join Carol and the others for story-time, or help Hershel with supper preparations. Maybe Beth would like a break from watching Judith."

"Beth doesn't need any help with Judy, and Hershel has Maggie to help him. You need the extra pair of hands. I'm not a kid anymore."

Rick disagreed. "You _are_ still a kid. More importantly, you're my kid. But…" he glanced around the wired walls that kept the walkers out. They also kept everyone in. Boys Carl's age were supposed to have space to grow and ride bikes. Nature hadn't intended for them to be cooped up in small spaces. "You're right. I could use the help. Grab a shovel. Let's go."

Zack was sitting with Daryl in the shade, watching as the older man used his knife to whittle a stick to a sharp point, when Rick found them. "Okay, I got it," the teenager said eagerly, gazing at his hero with barely concealed admiration. "You were a corrections officer before all this started. That's it, isn't it?"

Daryl snorted. "What gives you that idea?"

"You navigate the prison well; you're always alert and prepared; you keep a calm head in any situation; you can stay awake and in one spot for long periods of time-"

"You have to be to stay alive in this world."

"Yeah, but you seem like you've always been like that. Plus you're kind of cynical and bossy." Daryl chuckled. "So, am I right?"

"No." Daryl grinned and shook his head. "You're not right."

"Darn it. I knew I should have gone with firefighter."

"Only one guess per day, Zacky-boy. Maybe you'll have better luck tomorrow."

Rick cleared his throat softly, hesitant to disrupt what felt like a sweet and affectionate moment – which, unfortunately, his friend Daryl didn't get many of. "Can I borrow Zack for a few minutes?" Zack stood abruptly. Rick half-expected the boy to salute. No matter how much he tried to pull away from leadership, people continually regarded him as an authority figure. Maybe it was his years on the force. Maybe it an inherent quality ingrained so deeply beneath his skin that he couldn't change it if he wanted to.

"What can I do for you, sir?" Daryl met Rick's eyes and gave him a smirk.

"I need you to open the gate for me and Carl. Keep a look-out in case we get into trouble."

Daryl was on his feet and reaching for his crossbow before Rick had finished his sentence. "Anything I can-"

"It's alright. We're just working on irrigation. Zack will be enough to cover us, and Glenn's on watch. I know you had a run planned for this afternoon. You go ahead." Daryl raised one eyebrow doubtfully, but did not question Rick's decision. He shouldered his bow and shrugged.

"Alright. You do what you want."

Zack grabbed a shotgun from the armory. He didn't have much experience shooting, but Daryl had been working with him. The boy had remarkably keen eyesight and aim. He'd make an excellent sniper – if he lived that long. In another world, he could have been an Air Force pilot or a cop.

Carl was waiting anxiously by the gate, shuffling his feet back and forth, like a puppy pawing at the front door because he really needs to pee. Rick used his set of keys to unlock the main gate, while Zack opened up their make-shift spiked gates – an idea stolen from Morgan – using the pulley system. He closed the gate behind them, and would keep watch from this position, alert and ready to open it again if they needed inside in a hurry. The woods had been quiet lately, but the peace was deceptive. Accidents could occur without warning. People died in the blink of an eye.

Beth was keeping a tally of days passed without incident. They had reached twenty a few days ago, but then Joni had been killed. Not by walkers, but an honest-to-god accident. She had slipped in a puddle and tumbled clear over the railing of the upper-level of the cellblock, crashing to the floor and splitting her head wide open. The brain injury had killed her, but they stabbed a knife through her skull just in case. They couldn't afford to take any chances.

Beth's calendar had been reset, and now they were on day 13 once again. She hoped to make it all the way to a hundred someday, but she'd settle for a month. One full month – that was all she asked for.

Equipped with shovels and buckets, father and son set out. There was a wooden bridge, nothing more than a couple dozen planks nailed together, stretching across the stream. Rick paused at the end and gazed at the surrounding trees. He hadn't seen _her_ in weeks, which he took as a positive sign – a return to sanity – but, secretly, he missed her. He knew it wasn't actually his wife; he knew it was an illusion, a hallucination, caused by the weight of grief and stress on his infected brain, but he missed _seeing_ her. Missed the loveliness of her face, the purity of her washed skin and white dress, no scars, no wounds. Perfect, just the way he remembered her. If he didn't see her anymore, he was scared one day he would forgot what she looked like. "Lori," his breath was a whisper, carried away by the soft stirrings of the wind.

"Dad, are you okay?"

"Fine. Let's get started. Stay close to me." The grass, unmowed and unkempt, had grown tall and wild along the banks and in the surrounding fields. It hushed sounds, and they had to keep extra alert for the shuffling feet of walkers. They dug, and time stretched away from them. The hot sun shone down from them and melted minutes into hours. Rick allowed his mind to go blank, focusing on each thrust of his shovel. In a couple hours, they had widened and deepened the boundaries of the stream significantly. Water, cool and cloudy, flowed from its hiding places beneath the earth, soaking their feet.

Rick paused , and wiped away the sweat on his forehead with the back of his hand. He sighed. The hard work was good. It kept his mind clear, vacant. Zack was leaning against the fence, taking a break from the pacing he had been doing. Back and forth, back, and forth – a little tin soldier. Carl was on the opposite side of the bank, closest to the tree-line. He was working at a steady place, the muscles under the flesh of his arms taut. He was tiring, Rick could tell, but there was an expression of contentment on his face. Carl was a lot like him – he always had to be moving, doing something. He needed more days like this – fresh air, nature, good hard work. Carl paused to rest, and examined his hands. "How are you doing?"

"Alright. My palms are all callused."

Rick laughed. "That's how you know you've done a good job. You-" He saw it first, the flash of auburn, like the color of fox's fur, but too tall – 5'6" at least. Too loud and too slow, a human gait stumbling through the brush. It appeared a second later, crashing through the trees no more than half a dozen yards behind his son. "Carl!"

Carl looked up at his father, alarmed by the panic in his voice. Rick tossed his shovel aside and grabbed for his knife, splashing through the water, muck spattering onto his pants and sucking at the soles of his shoes. Carl turned and saw the woman in the bloodied shirt staggering quickly toward him. She was only a few feet away now. Rick knew he'd never make it in time.

"Carl!"

"Dad, wait!"

Eyes. Carl had noticed her green eyes, alive and wet. Her gaze met his, and a mixture of emotions crossed her face in a split-second. Confusion, sadness, fear. "Davy?" she asked, and collapsed at the boy's feet.


End file.
